Parenting books...you know what they are like. They clue you into the behaviour of children and they tell you how to fix it. This book by Paul David Tripp is actually different! So glad that I chose to review it. Called Parenting: 14 Gospel Principles that can radically change your family.

First don't expect a how to book. That's not what this book is about. This book is all about changing how you think about parenting. About seeing it as an ambassador, where the job you do is on behalf of someone bigger than you. Like an ambassador can serve their country by helping citizens abroad and acting as a go between. We are ambassador, raising our children, being used as a tool by God.

To that end, Mr. Tripp works us through the following four principles.

Parenting is hard work. It is by far the hardest thing I have ever done and I often feel like I am totally messing it up. My goal is help my boy love the Lord, to see himself for who he is, a person desperately needing the Lord ALL THE TIME, to teach him to be better than me and to have a big heart for people. What he does for a living or how much he makes matters not. I do have side goals of having him be a well-rounded, able to work hard at a trade, as well as having the skills to manage a white collar job should that be a choice of his. Right now...he has a love of snakes and for people to know the Lord...it's good eh?

But raising a sensitive minded boy is hard when you are quick to raise a voice, or to let your own failings/sin get in the way of truly listening to a child. So I had my lad read this passage out of the book.

You see my lad assumes that somehow he is wrong. When I apologize to him for my stuff getting in the way of really listening to him...he tells me I have nothing to apologize for and I have this strong desire for him to realize that it is NOT ALWAYS his fault. It is sometimes MY fault. When he read this passage his eyes lit up...it was like he understood what I've been trying to say. This is a good thing eh? When a lad starts t realize that a mom has her own sin and her own stuff that she is growing and developing in. We are ALL maturing in our faith.

That is what this book points us to. How we are all growing and developing. What we say and do all points us to our need for Christ.

All Mr. Tripp has done is broken down that need into fourteen different areas to help us in our edification. I am looking forward to finishing this book. :) I am wondering what the Lord would have me learn.

This looks like a really good book. I have gotten pretty discourage with parenting books in general because they are all so cut-and-dried. Do this get this result and parenting is never like this. This book looks different. Thank you for sharing about it.

annette @ a net in time

10/30/2016 11:02:41 pm

it is different Lori... I think I will make it my next read through the chapters and comment on them book.

To answer the question: I think the most intriguing idea in that listing is "grace." We have been talking with the girls a lot lately about giving grace but not taking advantage of the grace issued. I'd like to read about what he has to say regarding grace.